


light bulb

by fourhorsemen



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Body Horror, Dark, Episode AU: s05e22 Swan Song, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-21
Updated: 2014-11-21
Packaged: 2018-02-26 09:22:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2646716
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fourhorsemen/pseuds/fourhorsemen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"The righteous man who begins it is the only one who can finish it." - 4x16</p>
            </blockquote>





	light bulb

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings for slight body horror, nothing graphic (very subtle).

He walks along the hallway, leaning to the right, trailing his fingers over the wall as he goes. There are cracks in the wall here, some deep grooves from where someone probably chipped at the plaster relentlessly. He likes to think he can see those holes, translate the feeling on his fingertips into an image. He knows its dark, its late. The clock chimed before signaling curfew and even if he had somehow missed the sound (never; he has sharp hearing), he'd know because where there is light there is heat. And he'd know if it was a light bulb because artificial light doesn't feel the same as the sun's rays. Light bulbs are glaring, bright and they hurt if you're too close, the sun is a deep, warm feeling that reaches your core.

He bumps into something in front of him and startles. There's nothing in this hallway, no obstructions - if it was a person he'd have heard the footsteps, a door opening, whispers of cloth - anything. He starts to panic, his breath comes quicker, he throws his hand out blindly and someone seizes his wrist. He struggles, slaps the palm of his other hand on their chest. It's flat, breathing in and out, heart beating against his hand and if he didn't know it before he knows its a man now. He gasps, tries to twist away but now the man has grasped other hand and he's scared. He's scared because this man's grip is too strong, a static charge on his skin he has felt before and it's not a feeling he associates in his mind with 'good.'

"Let me go," he rasps and struggles some more. Something flashes through his mind, something bright and ten times more glaring than the light bulbs in the 'white-room' they sometimes take him to when he's sick. He hears the echo of a sound - a voice, he thinks instinctively - something that drowns his hearing, hurts his eardrums and for a second he thinks he's bleeding but its a phantom feeling because nothing drips down his neck when he shakes his head. He fists his hands and tries to throw his weight forward to push the man away. The man doesn't so much as budge, he exhales sharply. His breath is coming faster now, he's hyperventilating and if this man doesn't let him go he'll have a panic attack right here, in this hallway.

"Please," he whispers, flails then shakes his head wildly, looks around - tries to - like he still can. He pushes, pulls, struggles and breaths fast and hard but the man does not move nor let him go. He chokes, gives a strangled cry then finally goes limp in the man's grip, falls pathetically into his attacker's chest.

Slowly, the man lets him go, loosens his hold on his wrists. He doesn't run. Where would he go? He doesn't have the will. He stays there, sagged against a stranger, all the fight drained out of him. His fists loosen into open palms, his right rests on the man's heart - _thump, thump, thump _. The rhythm lulls him, silences any other panic he might have had and muffles it all. He stays there.__

The man pulls him upright, reaches a hand up to his face and when he says something, it's like something far away, a sound wave through the ocean in his mind.

"Dean," he whispers hoarsely, sadly and strokes a hand across his cheek, fingers trailing across an empty eye socket.

 

* * *

 

> "What do you want me to do? Let him jump in the fucking pit? One Wichester for another?" he hisses. Castiel flinches.
> 
> "I'm not doing it Cas, he's my responsibility - look after Sammy - the one thing my father taught me right," he is passionate and devoted in his fury. Castiel cannot change his mind, neither with force nor with love.
> 
> "Michael can end this before Lucifer even gets his vessel, takes my brother as his vessel! Michael can end Lucifer on the spot and if he needs me to do it then I say yes. **_Yes_** ," he shouts and Castiel too is lost, blinded in the light that rains down from the heavens, golden and all encompassing - shaking the Earth to its core.
> 
> Michael has arrived.


End file.
